A Kamloops Mountie has been cleared of any wrongdoing by the province’s police watchdog after a man broke a bone in his heel during an incident in April 2019.

The incident happened when a man fled the scene after allegedly breaking into an RV in Kamloops on April 21. That’s according to a report by the Independent Investigations Office (IIO) released today.

Chief Civilian Director Ronald MacDonald says the man was found by an RCMP officer near the Canadian Tire. According to a statement from the officer, the man was “red-faced, sweaty, breathing heavily, and hiding” by a stack of wooden pallets, which is when the officer pulled out her firearm and ordered him to stop.

The man did not respond, and the officer says she was scared that he was possibly reaching for a weapon.

MacDonald’s report says the officer ordered the man to get on the ground, but instead he jumped off a four-foot retaining wall and broke a bone in his foot.

In his ruling, MacDonald says there are no reasonable grounds to believe that an offence was committed. But he did raise concerns that the officer chose to draw her weapon instead of waiting in her vehicle for backup.

He chalked it up to the officer being “relatively inexperienced” and acting out of a sense of duty in a fluid, quickly developing situation.

“While there were other options that might have been more appropriate, once she had decided to act as she did, it was not entirely unreasonable for her to conclude that she was justified in drawing and pointing her pistol at the man,” noted MacDonald.

You can read the full decision here.

@IIOBC is issuing a public report today regarding the injury of a male while being apprehended by RCMP members in Kamloops https://t.co/tACA3WXgOG

— IIOBC (@iiobc) April 16, 2020